All - thought you might find this useful. I have seen the state of many people's air duct rubber connectors and decided to see if I could recreate them with 3D printing in a material called TPU, which is nice and soft. I have finished the first print and wanted to give you all a chance to give any feedback. These are for the later 851s, and all of the 888 Stradas, SP4s, SP5s and SPOs. The internal thread of the part comes out a little rough, but will respond well to a wire brush connector on my Dremel. Personally I an very please with them and now looking to reproduce the other ends of the pipes for the early and later (rear entry and front entry) airbox connectors.
Nice work and I take my hat off to you but... The original 851/888 air intakes/hoses were a very good example as to "How not to do it", so much so that if you junked them all into the bin it wouldn't affect the bikes performance in any way. Steve R
Your thread-area support structures don't look like TPU. Is that cos your support structures are a more-rigid material? Just interested...
Thanks for the insight Steve. Understand where you are coming from, however they are original to the bikes and would be good to use this as an opportunity to do an “upgrade”, even if it was of limited effect at the time. A little like the underslung rear calliper, look good but minimal effect.
I had a similar discussion: http://www.ducati851and888.net/showthread.php?11484-888-SP4-Airbox As it looks pretty ineffective...
The thread area is just the stringing left behind from the TPU during printing, which is on the underside of the print surface. It doesn’t use supports, as the printer I am using cools the material at the point of printing, so limited need for a supporting structure.
